In an attempt to increase the adoption of printing in the SMBs segment, HP India has introduced high capacity and cost-effective, Laser Tank printer ‘Neverstop’, specially designed for SMB customers. Post the GST implementation, the printing need of SMBs have surged significantly, thereby to meet this growing demand and address the pinpoints coming from the burgeoning SMBs, HP has introduced Laser Tank printer.
In the Indian market, HP has a strong legacy in the printing business since 1989. It is safe to say that one out of every two printers sold in India is from HP. From the strategy perspective, HP continues to innovate from the core printing requirement as well as redefine and disrupt the printing category. In line with its plan to expand the laser printer portfolio, the company looks to redefine the SMB segment’s printing need.
Talking about the current trends in the printing industry, Leo Joseph, Senior Director – Printing Systems and Solutions, HP Inc India, says, “We have been constantly working towards making our products relevant in the future. We are seeing a lot of shifts in the industry, the way we live and work. We call it the ‘One Life’ which is basically the same device we have at home or in the office. There are a few things happening as a trend; one is obviously the rapid urbanisation where we are witnessing a lot of small cities getting bigger in size. There are now a lot of opportunities in the cities and migration rates are getting high. The second one is the changing demographics in the country. The third one is innovation accelerator. For example, an innovation which used to happen once in every 20 years now happens in every two-three years. These are being driven by startups and SMBs customers. They play a big role in day-to-day innovations.”
While sharing the printing need of SMB customers, Joseph says, “SMBs or startups need simple, yet affordable printing solutions. We came up with a product called ‘Neverstop Laser’ which reaffirms the old belief of the SMB customers that it will never be off and the business will keep running. This printer has the world’s first laser tank technology. The highlight is that this printer has more printing capacity than other printers. Normally, a laser printer prints 2000 pages, but we have provided 5,000 pages. The biggest change is instead of replacing the toner, we have come up with on-field replacement, HP toner reload kit. The biggest benefit is that we are further reducing the cost of printing by 80-85 per cent. Today the price of laser printing is around one-and-a-half paise per page, but the HP Laser Tank will reduce it to 29 paise. It satisfies all the demands that an SMB customer would make.”
“The adoption of printing is increasing in among Indian SMBs. We are breaking the biggest barrier in printing – affordability. Others often focus more on technology, product, quality, etc. Now we have made an affordable product with best ever quality of printing,” he says.
Overall, 1.6 million units of laser printers sell in a year and HP claims to have over 60 per cent share in it. With the new range of printers, the company is also looking to address the refill and fake cartridges issue to a large extent. Today, HP has a large portfolio of printing solutions; be it inkjet, laser, and large format. The company is also catching up fast in A3 printers segment after it acquired Samsung printers.
Today, HP printers command a significant position be it home, enterprise and commercial segments. The Neverstop printers range starts from INR 15,846 and the toner kit-single pack comes at INR 849.
Tech giant HP has launched a cost-effective Laser Printer named “Neverstop’ specially for the small and medium-sized customers in an attempt to meet the growing demand of printers. I personally feel it is really a great step taken by HP.